Author Archives: Alan

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Why “buy and hold” is nonsense and not the key to successful investing

One of the first major “mindset tips” new investors either directly receive from someone more experienced or stumble upon by themselves is to “buy and hold” stocks. The reasoning seems to make sense, as a longer holding period should level out short term fluctuations and enable a positive investing outcome. However, this concept does not take into account a key component, misleading many investors, often causing avoidable disappointments.

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Will Philip Morris split itself, soon?

Company transformations and separations are not an uncommon occurrence. The goal of so-called spin-offs is to grow by shrinking first. Such special situations can create shareholder value that is uncorrelated to broader markets. Over the past days, I started to think through possible coming spin-offs. The iconic Marlboro maker Philip Morris came to my mind, as it could slowly start to make sense for them to start a divorce to focus on their growing business unit, throwing off ballast and cashing out, soon.

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Is the stock of M&T Bank the best pick among regional US-banks?

After the first wave of banking collapses last March and some subsequent calming down, the last few weeks have again been dominated by fears about who’s next. The California based First Republic Bank was the next to fall. Its assets were sold to JPMorgan. Stocks of other regional banks got hammered by even 50% in single trading days, as if this were nothing unusual. The search for the next victim is running. M&T Bank so far held up rather well (and managed to stay under the radar). Is it worth a closer look?

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The Panic of 1907 – a financial chain reaction

With this Weekly, I am finally writing my first book review. The book I now finished, is about the financial panic of 1907. However, it is not just a short-lived event with a simple crash in stock markets, limited to that particular year, as the title might suggest. Furthermore, it is about a sequence of events that caused a chain reaction of significant relevance, laying the foundation for the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank (although not what you know today).

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Have you missed the best stock of the last 25 years? Here’s a second chance!

Last week, I wrote about missed opportunities and their lasting impact on me. Actually, they hurt me more and stay with me longer than realized losses where I have taken my lessons learnt. Today, I want to discuss one of the most successful – if not even THE most successful – stock(s) of the last quarter-century. Nearly self-explanatory, this was a somewhat surprising business development that many (including me) have missed. Is there maybe a second chance?

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Suffered losses or missed opportunities – what’s hurting more?

Over the last days, I was thinking about some personal stock investments that I either sold too early or even never managend to initiate at all – because I was waiting for a correction which never came. To the contrary, I have to really think longer and more intense about realized losses, just to name a few – not because there were none (there were), but because I threw them out of my mind.

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German Conglomerates: Creating Shareholder Value from spin-offs? + new research report

Decades ago, it was en vogue to create big conglomerates. Size was associated with being a sign of strength, bringing robustness in times of economic distress. However, as “holding discounts” nowadays are holding these companies back from achieving higher valuations, the opposite direction is pursued to lift these “hidden values”. Many German concerns are currently in this process. There is also one particular under the radar opportunity that is too cheap to be ignored.

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US shale production is peaking – what it means for oil and gas prices

You can read everywhere that due to the “coming recession” in Western countries, energy demand is going to take a hit and push prices down. Likewise, you also find headlines that Chinese recovery demand might come in below expectations. It is a foregone conclusion that prices of energy will go down – everything circles around demand. But is this the big picture? What would happen if a massive supply shock took market participants by surprise? You won’t be surprised, but prepared, with this latest Weekly.

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A company uranium investors should be monitoring closely

The investment thesis and the soil for expected higher uranium prices is based on a growing supply and demand imbalance. This is what I already wrote about. An underinvested, not growing supply base is facing higher, maybe even way higher demand from existing as well as new nuclear reactors that are under construction. Today, I am discussing the biggest uranium project under development.

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